[jessupjonesjnr87]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/22/south-sudan-juba-civil-conflict

Fleeing workers tell of brutal killings as South Sudan edges towards civil war
A long line of evacuees stretched from the departures area of Juba airport into the baking sun of South Sudan. Meanwhile, the dented doors of the arrivals building slowly disgorged dazed and exhausted oil workers in filthy overalls. They had fled to the capital from the further reaches of the world's youngest country, on the first leg of journeys home, bringing with them news of factional fighting that has taken the country to the brink of civil war.

Many of them such as Hassan Ali, a Pakistani engineer, with dark circles around his eyes, had just escaped from Unity state with terrifying accounts of killing in the vast oil fields that feed oil production in both Sudans.

For the last three days terrified oil workers have listened to the carnage beyond the perimeter.

"It was Sudanese killing Sudanese," he said. "They were killing each other with stones and knives," said one of his colleagues before making a cut-throat gesture. A third man, who gave his name as Dabeer, spoke of one attacker whom he had seen chopping the hands from victims. The men said that at least 16 people had died, many of them ordinary South Sudanese out of uniform. On their way to the airstrip in Unity town they had seen scores of scorched huts.

"There were more than 20 burnt to the ground," said Ali.

Unity state, which provides much of the crude on which South Sudan's fledgling economy relies, has become the centrepiece of a power struggle between government forces and an emerging armed opposition. A stream of defections by senior military officers has split the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), with Major General James Koang Choul, commander of the division that controls the state, emerging as the latest to turn his back on President Salva Kiir yesterday.

Heavy fighting between ethnic Dinka, who hail from the same tribe as the president, and the Nuer kinsmen of the fugitive former vice president Riek Machar have been struggling for control of the oil which is pumped by Chinese and Malaysian companies.

With a haze coming off the rough concrete blocks, outside Juba's squalid airport snaking lines of hundreds of Chinese oil workers tried to hide from the sun by putting coats and T-shirts over their heads. Song Liu had been waiting for nearly four hours for his company, the China Petroleum Engineering & Construction Corporation (CPECC) to get him out via Dubai to Beijing . . .

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/12/21/uk-southsudan-unrest-idUKBRE9BI0TX20131221

U.S. aircraft hit by gunfire in South Sudan as conflict worsens
Three U.S. aircraft came under fire from unidentified forces on Saturday while trying to evacuate Americans from a spiralling conflict in South Sudan. The U.S. military said four of its members were wounded in the attacks.

Nearly a week of fighting in South Sudan threatens to drag the world's newest country into a Dinka-Nuer ethnic civil war just two years after it won independence from Sudan with strong support from successive U.S. administrations.

The U.S. aircraft came under fire while approaching the evacuation site, the military's Africa Command said in a statement. "The aircraft diverted to an airfield outside the country and aborted the mission," it added.

The statement said all of the three Osprey CV-22 aircraft involved in the mission had been damaged.

Consequently, U.S. President Barack Obama warned that any move to take power by military means would lead to an end of U.S. and international community support for South Sudan.

The United Nations mission in South Sudan said one of four U.N. helicopters sent to Youai, in Jonglei state, had come under small-arms fire on Friday. No crew or passengers were harmed.

Hundreds of people have been killed in the fighting between Dinka loyalists of President Salva Kiir and Nuer supporters of former Vice-President Riek Machar, who was sacked in July and is accused by the government of trying to seize power.

Fighting has spread from the capital, Juba, to vital oilfields and the government said a senior army commander had defected to Machar in the oil-producing Unity State.

The German military said on Saturday it had evacuated 98 people, including Germans and other nationals, from South Sudan by air to neighbouring Uganda. The German ambassador to South Sudan was among them, the Foreign Ministry in Berlin said.

A separate plane took Lieutenant-General Hans-Werner Fritz, chief of Germany's Operations Command, along with his aides and five other Germans, to Berlin, the military said.

After meeting African mediators on Friday, Kiir's government said on its Twitter feed that it was willing to hold talks with any rebel group. The United States is sending an envoy to help find a negotiated solution.

South Sudan's foreign minister, Barnaba Marial Benjamin, told Reuters the government had given African mediators the go-ahead to meet Kiir's rivals, including Machar and his allies.

Ethiopia's Foreign Minister Tedros Adhanom, who led an East African delegation of foreign ministers in Juba aimed at mediating between the feuding sides, said the team did not manage to meet Riek Machar face to face, neither did they make phone contact.

"We are trying to contact them. We are hopeful of having both sides on the negotiating table within the space of 10 days," Tedros told Reuters.

In their meeting with Kiir, Tedros said they were also aiming to get humanitarian aid to afflicted populations unhindered.

Looks like its war.

[Beren]

Hey Jessup, isn't it 2:30 am in Ireland? How come you're not being too tired for this?

[jessupjonesjnr87]

It's saturday(well sunday now), still early. i'm after getting knocked out of a little fifa tournament four of us are having so I decided to cook up some grub and post a thread about Sudan, although what that has to do with the civil war I'm not sure.

[Rei Murasame]

Looks like South Sudan took on your recommended reforms, Jessup:

I would set in plans to inevitable dissolve the government, police force and national armed forces. Replacing them with a coalition of local militias and councils. Each province would be run like an individual nation by its council with minimal interference from a UN like body that would link all the councils together. Voting would be mandatory but almost everything else would be left up to the individual councils.

Pretty funny, right?

There are about 100 ethnic sub-groups in South Sudan and it has one of the lowest rates for primary school completion in the world, and one of the lowest numbers of paved roads as well. Everyone seems to be rushing for the exits now: [Link: RAF evacuates Britons from South Sudan].

Another great (read: dismal) piece of African policy brought to you by the Anglo-American non-planners.

[Far-Right Sage]

If memory serves, I and several others stated upon the day of the South Sudanese declaration of independence that it was an unsustainable non-functional project artificially created by foreign powers which would end in violent collapse.

Others, ignoring South Sudan's inherent structural problems and incoherence as a state supported that move because of the implications of "democracy" and because Omar al-Bashir is a dirty "tyrant". Sure, go ahead - It's wise to create a new state where the vast majority of people are illiterate. For as long as international policy refuses to meet with reality, these scenarios will play out time and time again.

I suspect China is having a good belly laugh. Washington's Sudanese project is in fast-acting collapse.